From Anam Cara, A Book of Celtic Wisdom John O'Donohue
...Spiritituality of friendship with the body

The body is your clay home, your only home in the universe. The body is the soul; this recognition confers a sacred and mystical dignity on the body. the sensors are devine thresholds. A spirituality of the senses is a spirituality of transfiguration....Thoughts are our inner senses...they bring out the mystery of inner landscape.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

When?Brookside Pottery hours will be by appointment and luck of the draw until Mid May.

I will be easiest to find on Monday mornings, Wed. and Fri. afternoons and Saturdays and by appointment.

Where?I am located in a garage down the alley off 37th Street. Actual address 1138D East 37th Street. Across from channel 2 on the west side of Peoria. Basically in the parking lot behind Locker's Hair. It is not as confusing as it sounds once you find the parking lot. Call 918 747-7574 for shop and my cell is 918 697-6364. I will help you find your way.

What is it?
Artists studio, my and my son's pottery for sale.

I sell many kinds of clay, low and high fire. I also carry Kemper Tools, Mud tools and more. The glazes I usually sell are Amaco, Spectrum and Laguna with a specialty in cone 5/6 glazes.

I also teach adult classes on Tuesday nights weather permitting, all levels with a class maximum of 8 students. Young adults are usually tutored on Saturdays for one hour at $25 per hour plus materials.

The rest of the story
Nothing stays the same and that is true with my very unconventional business as well. So Brookside Pottery or me, Linda Coward continues to change to survive. If you are looking for a Walmart or a Hobby Lobby or A freshly painted up town gallery, keep looking. This is alternative shopping from the artist's working studio.

It is fun to meet people who find me on line and come to check it out or buy clay and tools. Sometimes people are looking for mugs or mass produced pottery. Well, that is not exactly what I am either.

The reaction to my alternative and creatively cluttered shop brings back memories of Santa Fe art studios in the early 70's. I usually apologize and try to clear a path to the customers needs. My studio space is small not 740 square feet compared to the 2600 I used to have. Yes, I need to keep sorting. But tucked in every nick and cranny of the shop you will fine tools, nature objects for inspiration, and projects in the works. It is fun and a little different. It is a very personal kind of shopping experience.

Brookside Pottery is a working pottery studio. I teach small classes, tutor adults and children and that is a great way to learn one to one. I also sell tools clay and glazes. I am an artist and I am a teacher. I have a masters degree and about 40 years of experience. And, like a crazy woman I share a lot of technical info with the community.

Now I have added more obligations to a very busy life. I am teaching 3 classes at Roger's State until May. This will affect the shop hours tremendously. I will be glad to meet anyone by appointment. The shop has limited heat sources as well but is a wonderful place to be especially in fair weather.

Monday, January 10, 2011

May your body be blessed.
May you realize that your body is a faithful and beautiful friend of your soul.
And may you be peaceful and joyful and recognize that your senses are sacred thresholds.
May you realize that holiness is mindful gazing, feeling, hearing , and touching.
May your senses gather you and bring you home.
May your senses always enable you to celebrate the universe and the mystery and possibilities in your presence here.
May the Eros of the Earth bless you.

Just got my new book Anam Cara, A Book of Celtic Wisdom by John O'Donohue
Love this one. I will relate it to pottery somehow later.

What a powerful and positive poem about the senses. Wish the poet was still alive. What insight!
I will see if I can translate this into a sensuous clay pot or figure. Clay the wonderful sensuous art material. Responsive and strong at the same time.

About Me

Brookside Pottery started in Tulsa in 1991. It is a working pottery studio with stoneware sculpture and dinnerware, clay glazes tools and equipment.
I have been making pottery and sculpture for over 35 years. In 1978 I finished my master's degree in ceramics from the University of Tennessee. I taught art at Webb middle school. I moved to Emory Va where I started Meadowview Pottery Workshop and taught part time at Emory and Henry College.My husband John and I moved to Austin Texas for his PHD and I worked at pottery shop Feats of Clay for 4 1/2 years. We moved to Norman OK for two years. Tulsa was our next move and I started Brookside Pottery about 18 years ago. I have studied with many significant potters across the nation including Fawn Navasie, Richard Zaken, Sylvia Hyman, Josh Deweiss, Hal Reiger and more. I have shown in McClung Museum,
Knoxville a couple of times, won various sculpture awards and most recently featured in 25 potters in Ok in Studio Potter magazine. I love raising my family and going to the movies with my husband. And, if I am not home I can only hope I am traveling in some exotic place and writing.